


U Éneer-nyt Nayltil

by kjack89



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types, Watership Down - Richard Adams
Genre: Alternate Universe - Animals, Alternate Universe - Watership Down Fusion, Blood, Canon-Typical Violence, Crossover, Implied/Referenced Torture, M/M, Only One Survives, Rabbits, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-18
Updated: 2014-09-18
Packaged: 2018-02-17 21:38:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,534
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2324051
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kjack89/pseuds/kjack89
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Les Amis stage a rebellion against General Woundwort's command at Efrafa.</p>
            </blockquote>





	U Éneer-nyt Nayltil

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Boots (pwnmercys)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pwnmercys/gifts).



> Title is a literal translation of “Les Misérables” into Lapine, the rabbit language: “The Miserable [very sad] Rabbits”.
> 
> This is an AU that I’ve wanted to write for a long time, but couldn’t think of a good story to tell, but one came to me, and I couldn’t stop myself. Ordinarily, I try to make my AUs accessible to those unfamiliar with the source material; in this case, as this is really more of a crossover in many respects than an AU, the opposite is true. I apologize to those who may not understand as much as they would like of the following story, but this is a story that I wanted to tell and to be able to do so, it required understanding of the events of Watership Down.
> 
> Takes place a little over a month before Bigwig’s incursion in Efrafa. All translations for the Lapine words and phrases used can be found at the end of the fic.

It was, as the rabbits call ‘after moonrise’ in Lapine, fu Inlé, and slowly, one by one, rabbits slipped out of the run to scatter across the grass to silflay. They were quiet, though whether that was by nature or simply because the almost full moon hanging heavily in the sky seemed to inspire quiet was anyone’s guess. One of these rabbits, a small, young buck who seemed more content than the others at the cool early June air and the moon that dappled the ground and their fur silver, nibbled on the edge of some clover before slipping closer to another rabbit. “Fine night,” the first said, glancing up at the moon.

“It would’ve been better a few hours ago,” the second rabbit groused, also lifting his head. He was much bigger than the first rabbit, big enough to be in the Owsla, the ruling rabbits of a warren, if he had wanted, and he had scars from previous fights and scraps that dotted his fur. He also seemed more nervous, glancing back at the mouth of the run before bending back down to the grass.

The first didn’t seem nearly as concerned, instead taking another bite of clover before saying, “Don’t be like that, Bahorel. It would have been too hot if we had been assigned to silflay at ni-Frith, and besides—”

Whatever he was about to say next was cut off by a third rabbit who lifted his head, his fur shining almost golden even despite the silvery light of the moon. “Bahorel — Prouvaire,” he called in a quiet but commanding voice, and both rabbits fell silent, returning to silflay.

On Bahorel’s other side, though, another rabbit, his fur so dark it was almost black, let out a derisive snort, staring unblinkingly at the golden rabbit. “Who does he think he is, Frith himself?” the rabbit muttered.

Bahorel shook his head and muttered to Prouvaire, “Grantaire seems in a fine mood. I can hardly wait for the meeting tonight.”

As if on cue, one of the sentries standing at the mouth of the run called the rabbits back to them, and slowly, the rabbits all loped back to the entrance. The dark rabbit was almost the last one to the run, clearly taking his time, and he was met by Prouvaire, who nosed his fur in a friendly way. “Be a good fellow and don’t give Enjolras too much trouble tonight, won’t you?” Prouvaire asked, a little anxiously, his eyes wide and his nose twitching.

Grantaire sighed and glanced at the sentries who were starting to get impatient with them. “I’ll give Enjolras-rah no more trouble than he’s due,” he told Prouvaire, who did not seem reassured, and slipped into the run. Prouvaire took one last, almost longing look at the moon and went in after him.

Down in the burrow, Prouvaire crowded in with the eight other rabbits who were gathered, pressed together in the way that rabbits did when they were seeking comfort together. Though not uncommon for rabbits to seek solace in this fashion, it was normally driven by the sort of external danger that was readily apparent; here, no such danger seemed to exist, though a few of the rabbits glanced at the entrance to the burrow as if someone or something might appear. Finally, the golden rabbit named Enjolras lifted his head, looking at each of the rabbits before saying quietly, “I think we’re ready to begin. The time is coming, almost here, in fact. The time to finally overthrow Efrafa and General Woundwort.”

His words went like a current through the assembled rabbits, and even more glanced towards the entrance, though the rabbit next to Enjolras, a big, calm fellow who seemed particularly laid back, nodded his head. “I agree with Enjolras,” he said. “The tyranny of General Woundwort has grown even more egregious with his refusal to allow any to leave Efrafa, and with the does not producing litters like they should be, things are getting worse and worse.”

“And being assigned to Marks, and not even allowed to silflay when we want,” Bahorel interjected, clearly still not happy at drawing such a late silflay time. He glanced at the rabbit he had interrupted and added belatedly, “Sorry, Combeferre.”

Combeferre shook his head, amused, and the rabbit on the other side of Enjolras shook his head as well. “Bahorel’s right. It isn’t natural keeping rabbits like this, and we’ve known that for awhile.”

Prouvaire nodded in agreement. “Since I was old enough to be marked,” he said, indicating the scar on his right foreleg, the scar that all the rabbits assembled in the burrow shared. “I’ve known it to be wrong for as long as that. We’re not meant to be hlessil, that much is obvious, but we’re still not meant to live like this, and General Woundwort and the Council’s latest reaction—”

“—Is exactly why the time is now,” Enjolras finished. He glanced to the rabbit to his left. “Courfeyrac has been coordinating with a few does from the right hind mark, and they seem ready, correct?”

Courfeyrac nodded. “We’ve all been coordinating with the other Marks,” he said. “Well, everyone besides Grantaire.”

The words weren’t meant maliciously, but in the back of the burrow, Grantaire nonetheless flinched, his ears pressing back against his head, and the rabbits on either side of him pressed against him in comfort. “Regardless,” one of them said loudly, “we’re as ready as we’re going to be. _They’re_ as ready as we’re going to be. And we’ve sworn to go through fire to see this done.”

“Joly’s right,” the rabbit on Grantaire’s other side agreed. “But it won’t be as easy as that. I know my luck is nothing to talk about—” The assembled rabbits shook their heads almost ruefully, because the rabbit in question, Bossuet, had terrible luck. “—but we will need luck on our side. The rest of the warren will be frightened. It’s all well and good for some of us, those whose parents came from elsewhere or who were once hlessi, but most of them have never seen elil. Their closest experience with a homba is in a story of El-ahrairah. They won’t even know how to defend themselves once the Owslafa is overthrown.”

A murmur of agreement ran through the burrow, as well as a collective shudder at the name of the rabbits chosen to protect Efrafa, worse than a normal Owsla, and Enjolras drew himself up, his gaze fierce, and he slowly looked each rabbit in the eye before pronouncing gravely, “Comrades, what they need to realize is that the real elil _are_ the Owslafa.”

With those words, the meeting seemed finished, and the assembled rabbits were quiet as they slipped back into the run to their own respective burrows. Combeferre and Courfeyrac remained inside, as did Grantaire, who crouched off to the side of the entrance, glancing at Enjolras as if he wished to speak with him but did not wish to approach. Enjolras looked at Grantaire and sighed. He told Combeferre and Courfeyrac, “Go. Get some sleep. We’ll plan more in the morning.”

Both rabbits glanced at Grantaire but nodded and left. Enjolras sighed again. “If you’ve come to offer more excuses—” he started, but Grantaire shook his head.

“No. No excuses beyond the only excuse I have. I am — I am tharn over what happened.”

“Don’t be,” Enjolras said, a little roughly. “It was foolish to send you in the first place. Bahorel would have been a better choice, were he not so vocally against the Owslafa.”

Grantaire flinched. “Please,” he said quietly. “Let me make it up to you. Let me do something, anything—”

“There is nothing to be done.” This time, Enjolras did not even try to hide the scorn in his voice. “We needed someone in the Owslafa. With your pedigree, you would have been perfect. Your father was a captain, after all. You would have been sure to win the confidence of the other officers quickly. But instead, you weren’t chosen.”

“And you think that was my fault.”

Enjolras looked at him coldly. “Who else’s fault would it be?”

Grantaire shook his head, for what was he supposed to tell Enjolras? How was he supposed to explain that the thought of joining the Owslafa had made his stomach churn? Even worse, how was he supposed to explain that the cause of freedom was not enough to overcome that feeling? He had never believed in the lofty ideals that Enjolras had been preaching in crowded burrows and in hushed tones during silflay or when passing hraka. Certainly he saw the tyranny of General Woundwort, certainly he saw the problems and the overcrowding and everything else wrong in this world called Efrafa. But he didn’t think that leading a haphazard rebellion against the Owslafa and against General Woundwort, whom many of the rabbits, misguided though they may be, saw as a savior from many of the harms common to rabbits, was going to work. And maybe that was his fault, and maybe it was his fault that when he had been sent before the General and the Council to apply for the Owslafa he had fumbled their questions at best or completely failed their examination at worst.

Maybe every of the worst things Enjolras had ever said about him was absolutely true.

But while Grantaire may not believe in overthrowing the Owslafa or freeing Efrafan rabbits from the tyranny of General Woundwort, he did believe in one thing: Enjolras. It was not uncommon for young male rabbits to form special bonds, and the bonds among the nine male rabbits called Les Amis de l’ABC was no exception. The feelings Grantaire had for Enjolras, however, were. There is no Lapine word for love — one can indeed argue that there is no rabbit concept of love the way humans feel it — but if ever there were, it would describe how Grantaire felt towards Enjolras.

Which only made it hurt worse to know that not only would Enjolras never feel the same, but was disappointed to the point of giving up on him entirely.

Enjolras just shook his head again, his ears pressed back against his head. “I knew better than to consent to try you.” He twitched his nose at Grantaire and turned away. “Now go.”

“Let me sleep here,” Grantaire said. He needed what small comfort it would be to sleep here in Enjolras's presence.

Enjolras rubbed his nose on his forepaws. “Go and sleep somewhere else.”

Grantaire crept forward, his ears pressed back, his eyes wide and pleading. “Let me sleep here — until I die.”

Enjolras sat up, his ears pricked, and regarded him disdainfully. “Grantaire, you are incapable of believing, or thinking, of willing, of living, and of dying.”

Still Grantaire crept further forward still, his ears pulled in, hunched as much as he could, and he told Enjolras softly, “You will see.”

Though Enjolras scoffed, he made no further protest, and Grantaire closed his eyes. After a long moment, Enjolras sighed and crossed to him, pressing his golden fur against Grantaire’s dark flanks, and a moment later, pressed together in the quiet of the burrow, both rabbits fell asleep.

* * *

 

“Tonight,” came the whisper, spreading through the Right Fore Mark like fire. “Tonight.” The entire Mark seemed on edge, jumpy during their early morning silflay and tense back in the burrows. “Tonight.”

But none was as tense as Grantaire, who crouched miserably near the mouth of the burrow, his ears pressed against his back, trembling as he looked at the ground and ignored anyone who came up to talk with him. Every now and then he would glance up as if looking for something or someone in the crowd of rabbits before dropping his eyes back down to the ground, nose twitching forlornly.

Both Bossuet and Joly crept over to him during the day, often both at the same time, pressing against him and nuzzling him in what little comfort they could offer, but Grantaire remained still, eyes downcast, frozen as if in slumber from which he could not wake.

“He’s gone tharn,” Joly muttered to Bossuet after one of these encounters as they waited word for what would happen next. He looked back at Grantaire, still crouching exactly where he had been that entire day. “I wish there was something we could do.”

Bossuet nibbled Joly’s fur affectionately. “It’s best this way,” he said, his voice low. “He’d be chasing the Black Rabbit of Inlé otherwise, and we need everyone ready for tonight.” He didn’t say that they needed Enjolras ready for tonight — he didn’t need to.

The plan for that night was a simple one. The Right Fore Mark was assigned evening silflay, following the Right Hind Mark. As the previous Mark was going back in to the burrow, Les Amis would burst out of the burrow, causing chaos among the few Oslafa sentries and inspiring both Marks to revolt. The thought or the hope was that once the two Marks were rebelling, the other Marks would undoubtedly follow suit.

“The rabbits will rise,” Enjolras had told them, with the quiet confidence borne of absolute conviction. “The rabbits will rise.”

And this was the day where it would all be put to the test.

The biggest key was keeping word of the plan from reaching the ears of the Efrafan sentries, lest they do something to prevent or ruin what was to take place, or worse, round up Les Amis and prevent not only that night’s plans but any future ones, and thus far, given the way the Owslafa officer on duty at the mouth of the run was currently yawning and scratching his ear absent-mindedly, it appeared to be working.

Indeed, the first part of the plan went as it should, with the Right Hind Mark rabbits clued in on the plan lingering out at silflay to draw the sentries from the run, and Les Amis, led by Enjolras, burst out of the run, followed by most of the Right Fore Mark.

Bahorel took out one of the sentries with a well-placed strike to his ear, while Combeferre reared up on his hind legs to box the other. With both sentries down, a cheer rang out among the rabbits, and Enjolras loped up a small knoll to shout to the assembled rabbits, “Comrades, the fight is not over but just beginning! We will see a new world, but we must not be complacent! This is not just about letting all partake in the benefits of the Owslafa, of choosing your burrows or getting to eat flayrah whenever you choose.This is not just a game of bobstones that young rabbits play but a fight for the life of all rabbits. Our children’s children will hear our story and rejoice for the sacrifice we made this day. Bral a bralvao!”

“Bral a bralvao!” the assembled rabbits called back, with some also calling, “El-ahrairah!” and “Frith!”.

But then, like a wind that broke against the downs, the Owslafa appeared from the burrows.

To their credit, the rabbits of the Right Fore and Right Hind Marks held their ground as best as they could, using the mouth of the run as a natural barricade to force the Owslafa to come at them only a few at a time. And if they had been joined by other Marks, they could undoubtedly have routed the Owslafa from Efrafa forever.

The other Marks did not stir.

From his position fighting against an officer on the knoll, Enjolras looked wildly to the other burrows as if expecting to see rabbits appear at any moment, but none appeared. He struck out, knocking the officer down, and called to all who were still listening, “Efrafa still lives in fear, but I promise our sacrifice here will not be in vain! Others will rise against tyranny until all rabbits are free!”

His words were noble, a rally cry for those who remained even as they all were pushed further into the run, but so few already remained. Enjolras joined them in a last ditch effort to take out as many as they could in a single stroke, but it was not to be.

The last to stand, Combeferre, Courfeyrac, Joly, and Enjolras, pressed back against the edge of the run, panting heavily, and Courfeyrac leaned over to wipe a trickle of blood from Combeferre’s cheek with his nose. Combeferre in turn pressed his nose against Courfeyrac’s shoulder. “Our children’s children will hear a good story,” he murmured, and all four stood a little straighter, their ears and tails rising, teeth bared as the Owslafa closed in.

It was over quickly, with Combeferre, Courfeyrac, and Joly falling under the teeth and claws of the officers until Enjolras alone was left, sitting up on his hind legs as if daring any to come closer. One of the officers muttered, “He is the leader! Woundwort would want us to take him down.”

Enjolras looked at them haughtily, his teeth bared. “Then take me.”

He put his forepaws back on the ground and lifted his chin, his eyes blazing as he awaited his fate.

The Owslafa officers glanced at each other, a little nervous at the glorious figure Enjolras still cut, his golden fur standing out against the dark wall of the run, and one even went so far as to whisper, though he was hushed instantly, “It seems to me that we are about to kill Frith.”

Still, the Owslafa paced forward, their teeth and claws at the ready, until, suddenly— “Long live hyaothil! I am one of them!”

It was Grantaire.

He alone had not come to silflay, had not joined his friends, still crouching as if gone tharn in the burrow. He listened unflinchingly to the sounds of defeat, but at the last moment, at just the perfect moment, he emerged, as ever, for Enjolras. His eyes as wide as a kitten above ground for the first time, his ears standing tall, he pushed through the officers to stand next to Enjolras, raising his chin as well as he told them, “Finish both of us at one blow.”

He turned to Enjolras to ask, a little hesitantly, “Do you permit it?”

Enjolras pressed against Grantaire in wordless response.

Then the Owslafa fell upon them.

* * *

 

“What is your name?” General Woundwort asked quietly.

The rabbit shook but didn’t say anything, and Woundwort looked at Campion, who brought his paw down on the rabbit, who squealed in pain. “What is your name?”

“Grantaire,” the rabbit cried, his dark fur even darker, sodden as it was with his blood mingled with the drying blood of Enjolras, whose body lay still against the wall of the run where he had fallen, where Grantaire had been taken and dragged away before Woundwort, who was looked coldly at him now. “My name is Grantaire.”

Woundwort didn’t speak, and this time, Campion raised his claws, raking them down Grantaire’s ear, ignoring his shrill screams. “You are not Grantaire,” Woundwort said calmly, not even flinching at the torture being inflicted in front of him. “You were not part of the group called ‘Les Amis de l’ABC’. You did not stage a rebellion against Efrafa that failed.”

Campion continued shredding Grantaire’s ear with his claws, and it seemed Grantaire’s screams had run dry as he shuddered against the ground. “You tried to run away,” Woundwort continued. “You tried to run away, and this is your punishment. Your friends are dead, and the memory of them and the treason they tried to commit erased. Do you understand?”

Grantaire was silent still, and Woundwort sighed, going over to him and raising one of his own paws in warning. “What is your name?” he asked, a third time.

“My name is Grantaire.”

Woundwort brought his paw down, and Grantaire’s screams started again.

* * *

 

Grantaire stared determinedly at the ground, ignoring the rabbits that passed through the run in front of him. He couldn’t have said what day it was, or even what time of day. It could have been ni-Frith or nInlé, and he would not have known the difference. He raised his head solely to scratch his neck, and noticed for a brief moment a rabbit staring at him from across the run. He was a big fellow, with a thatch of fur on the top of his head. Grantaire thought, vaguely, that he had heard one of the Owslafa call him Bigwig, but he neither knew nor care, and the thought was out of his head by the time he bowed it again.

He did not look up when one of his guards nudged him, and he only knew that the rabbit was standing in front of him when he was asked, “Who are you?”

Grantaire had been asked that so many times since that day, that day that he no longer properly remembered, and he answered it the same way he had since General Woundwort’s claws had torn without mercy through his mutilated ears, since he had realized none would hear his cries, since he came to the realization that the only rabbit he had ever loved was dead.

“My name is Blackavar, sir.”

**Author's Note:**

> Translations from Lapine:
> 
> -fu Inlé: after moonrise  
> -silflay: to feed above ground  
> -Owsla: a group of favored rabbits who protect the Chief Rabbit and his doe and exercise authority  
> -ni-Frith: noon  
> -Frith: the sun; chief god of the rabbit pantheon  
> -hlessi (plural hlessil): a rabbit living alone, out in the open  
> -elil: enemy  
> -homba: fox  
> -El-ahrairah: rabbit folk hero  
> -Owslafa: Council police; Efrafa’s Owsla  
> -tharn: heartbroken; frozen with fear  
> -hraka: excrement  
> -Black Rabbit of Inlé: god of death  
> -flayrah: exceptionally good food  
> -bob-stones: a traditional game among rabbits  
> -Bral a bralvao: Believe and hope  
> -hyaothil: the future  
> -nInlé: midnight


End file.
